Don't Get Too Close
by sullarco
Summary: Vlad comes back from space a year later and doesn't expect the things he finds upon his return. / vlad x danny (can be seen as friendship)


He expected Danny to say no; desperately wished, prayed for him to say yes, but Vlad had learned nothing if not that you couldn't dare hope for anything good. To always assume the worst. That Danny would agree to hide him, help him, was far fetched an idea enough itself. He would attempt to survive his last days on earth, alone, unwanted, hated (not much different from when he was "alive" and Vlad Masters still existed), and he would die that way. A part of him wanted that; welcomed it.

Honestly, he was tired. Tired of the way his brain worked after a year among the cosmos, tired of being let down, tired of existing.

He came face to face with danny, solid and real and very much not a billion silent, twinkling, unreachable lights. Danny wearily regards him from across the bedroom, his face shocked and suspicious and something else that must be pity. Vlad requests his help, voice rough and quiet and pathetic from disuse but he was beyond caring. Just wanted Danny to answer him, waits for the boy's decline, wanting so desperately to hear his voice after all of his time in sensory deprivation.

"Yes." Danny said, just as quietly and just as unsure as the man opposite him.

"Of course Daniel, I understand-" his voice broke, his shocked smile a little manic, "Wait, w-what did you-"

"Yes, " Danny repeated quickly, "Yes, I... I want to help you."

Vlad awoke slowly, realizing he'd passed out on Danny's bed after his midnight visit. He was vaguely aware of a voice at his ear attempting to rouse him.

"_Vlad_," Danny whispered; so urgent, forceful. "You need to turn invisible_ now_."

Why would he need to do that, his sleepy head supplied, but invisibility was basically second nature to him now and Danny was requesting it of him so he complied. When he did, he was vaguely aware of more voices, now, but he was too far gone to hear their meanings. While one was definitely Danny, he suspected the other two to be Jack and Maddie- and that made him tense and stiffen. He barely dared to breathe. The voices stopped, and still he did not break his invisibility. Only when Danny placed a blind hand on his upper arm did Vlad allow himself to be seen.

He silently gazed at Danny in the 6am light. Barely anything about the boy had changed. He'd not yet reached his growth spurt but some of his baby fat had disappeared. The most notable change about Danny was the steak of white in his hair which Vlad vaguely recalled from before the asteroid. At the time, he'd been too preoccupied and too crazy to pay attention to it, but now it stuck out it at him curiously. Could he ask about it. Did he have the right.

He stared until Danny became tense, talking in fear of being asked questions. "I have to go to school." It was a flat excuse and they both knew it, but Vlad was far beyond caring at this point. "Just... stay hidden, get some rest. I'll feed you when I get home."

Vlad felt as if he were a pet danny may be hiding under his bed but he said nothing about it. He simply rolled over, and fell asleep.

All day he slipped in and out of waking, hearing from Danny's room the loud noises that drifted from the Fentons' lab. Every time a particularly loud or startling noise erupted in his ears he would jolt awake and shrink into invisibility. He, Vlad Masters, was scared. Scared of being discovered. Scared of life in prison or whatever other sentence he would be subjected to. Scared of seeing that look on Jack's face for a second time.

Still, he was tired, but it seemed falling asleep and waking up every hour and a half was only making him more exhausted than before, and he longed to slip into unconsciousness, who cared if it was forever.

Eventually Danny returned home to find Vlad on the floor, his face pressed into the carpet. He didn't want to take Danny's bed and be given Danny's comfort and Danny had probably slept on the floor last night anyway. As promised, Danny brought him things to eat, and Vlad ate slowly and without complaint. In fact he was hesitant to say anything at all to Danny. He watched Danny keep to the other end of the room, doing his homework and texting on his phone, and not sparing Vlad a second glance. Eyeing Danny's clock, Vlad suspected Danny had come straight home with no distractions from his friends. He must not have mentioned Vlad's return to his ghost hunting gang.

"Why haven't you changed back." Danny asked him suddenly.

Vlad stilled from his corner of the room, feeling caught. Changed back. It had been so long since he'd been in human form he was almost scared, now. Would he- would he still be alive, after having been in ghost form for so long a time?

"I would rather wait until some of my strength has returned." Vlad answered simply. He wondered if Danny could hear the way his voice shook. He paused before continuing. "What about you? No after school ghost hunting?"

Danny turned around to face him then. He looked confused by Vlad's words, and almost pained by them, too. "Didn't you- you didn't know?"

Vlad kept his face passive, blank. He didn't know to what Danny could be referring to. After the asteroid... had the ghosts disappeared from Amity Park? Deciding to no longer mess with Danny Phantom? Vlad was sure Jack and Maddie were aware of the boy's powers by this point, maybe he'd been forbidden until he was of age; over protective parents and all, not that he'd ever known Jack or Maddie to be as such. After a long silence Danny bit his lip and looked down, as if debating whether or not to tell the man whom he'd once regarded as his nemesis.

"Vlad I- I got rid of my ghost powers."

It only made sense, the more Vlad thought about it. Why hadn't the boy just turned Vlad invisible himself if he needed to? Why did he come home seeming weary as if he'd walked the entire way, instead of flying? Vlad wondered idly if the white streak in Danny's hair was from trauma or a remnant of his ghostly powers.

Danny had willingly given up his powers. He didn't talk about all the reasons, but Danny did express how relieved he'd been without the weight of super powers. He'd felt right again, felt human again. But he didn't tell Vlad the nasty after effects.

Yes, Vlad had followed him to school one day, invisible, and without Danny's ghost sense he was undetectable. While it was true he was the brains behind turning the planet intangible, behind bringing the ghosts together to help him, he was also known as the hero of Amity Park who had chosen to give up his powers to be normal again. It was public knowledge that Danny Phantom was no longer Special or a Hero. He was just fourteen year old Danny Fenton again.

It seemed it was this that forced Danny's two closest friends away from him. Tucker and Samantha no longer seemed to even hang out with each other, without the glue of Danny between them. The chains of protecting the city were gone, and Danny wanted to be happy, but all his fellow peers seemed to think about was how boring he was now. At least he seemed to be exempt from his regular bullies' attentions.

Still, Danny wondered the school's halls alone. Even now, a year after the incident, he looked as if he didn't know what to do with himself, going through the motions, tormented by how obviously his former friends blatantly ignored him. Vlad did not follow him to school, again.

But Danny convinced himself he was happy. He did his homework, his relationship with his parents seemed to have improved (while his relationship with his sister seemed to have gotten worse), and whenever he wasn't with Jack and Maddie (helping them with ghost equipment) he was with Vlad.

He didn't try to avoid to avoid Vlad as the man would have thought. Sometimes Danny would sit at his desk and spend time on his phone, the space between them silent but comfortable. At night, Vlad had insisted Danny get his rest for school and sleep in his own bed. Vlad was strong enough to float and sleep at the same time now, so he didn't lay on the uncomfortable floor and worry Danny.

Of course, one night, some time later, Danny tried to convince Vlad to take his human form again.

Danny assured him everything would be fine. Danny didn't know if it would be or not. Vlad knew he didn't. But still he felt like he could trust those words to be true. That yes, everything would be fine. Vlad felt the familiar energy surge around him felt the black rings pass over his body, and collapsed onto Danny. Heavy as he was, Danny made sure not to drop him, and not quite as gently as he wanted, lay Vlad on the bed.

His human body felt so weak, and he knew if he had changed back upon his arrival to earth, his body surely would have died.

Vlad turned over on the bed, wanting to hide himself but not having the energy to do much more than that. He couldn't voice what was in his head. Don't look at me. I'm but the hollow shell of what was once a man. A despicable, terror of a man.

He couldn't see Danny's expression with his face pressed into the blankets, but he heard Danny's bright laugh fill the room. Vlad decided he liked it a lot. Perhaps too much.

"You're a little worse for wear, but you still look like the same ol' fruitloop."

Between the familiar nickname and Danny's support to him with just one sentence, Vlad could no longer stand it, and he let tears fall from his eyes in relief.


End file.
